Yen also pointed out how such a court decision could help cut inflation in the US, too, “by dropping the price of a significant chunk of digital purchases by 30% overnight”.
I bet most companies will just take that extra 30% as profit rather than giving it back to their users like proton has.
Yeah, even of the companies don’t pocket the difference, he’s an idiot to suggest that this will cut inflation.
This guy is just not very smart, I think.
I think he’s a salesperson trying to sell the idea that getting rid of the apple tax is good for consumers.
getting rid of the apple tax is good for consumers.
I mean that’s not wrong. I had no idea Apple was double-dipping like this. I wonder if Google is doing the same thing…
Every store does this. Even Holy Valve
Every company who takes a cut from in-app purchases, be it subscriptions or DLC, should be kneecapped by this ruling.
It’s one thing for the hosting marketplace (App Store, Steam, Play Store, etc) to take a cut from the initial purchase of a game/app. But it’s a whole other issue for that initial marketplace to keep reaching further into the dev’s pockets and take a cut from in-app purchases unrelated to where it was originally obtained.
That just turns paid apps into splash screens for in-app purchases though. That way apple never gets a cut because the “purchase” is in-app. Pay to be listed (maybe tiered depending on downloads) seems fair especially because it doesn’t incentivize people to do scammy things with pricing. It’s already a fee anyway.
That just turns paid apps into splash screens for in-app purchases though
Welcome to Android lol
I’m not entirely optimistic about this ruling, but we’ll see.
Apple had no reason NOT to give refunds and then use their weight to claw it back from the app developer.
But what happens when not-too-legit apps use non-AppStore external sites to unlock features in an app?
In a perfect world it’s cheap and easy and reliable.
But it can also be a scammy shop that lures you into expensive subscriptions with no easy way to cancel them (eg. gym membership) and what happens when Little Timmy spends $9000 for Nlartbux in a mobile game’s external store?
Could go either way 🤷🏻♂️
I’m not entirely optimistic about this ruling, but we’ll see.
Apple had no reason NOT to give refunds and then use their weight to claw it back from the app developer.
Greed.
But what happens when not-too-legit apps use non-AppStore external sites to unlock features in an app?
I suppose we will see what happens. That’s a very slippery slope though, full of FUD, and is the same logic that Apple, Microsoft, and others try to use to keep users locked into their walled gardens.
In a perfect world it’s cheap and easy and reliable.
But it can also be a scammy shop that lures you into expensive subscriptions with no easy way to cancel them (eg. gym membership) and what happens when Little Timmy spends $9000 for Nlartbux in a mobile game’s external store?
Could be. Multiple alternative markets exist for Android already though, and some shops are scammy as fuck. Google has already put protections in place to prevent sideloading potentially harmful apps (including alternative markets), but the savvy user who knows how to bypass those restrictions should* know how to spot scammy shit.
Could go either way 🤷🏻♂️
“For your security” was never about security.
what happens when Little Timmy spends $9000 for Nlartbux in a mobile game’s external store?
That’s why you don’t put your credit card info in a phone or tablet and let kids play with it.
What? Since when does Valve prohibit companies from redirecting customers to non-Valve purchasing flows? Because that’s what this ruling is about, it says Apple can’t prohibit apps from telling users to go buy off-platform for lower prices. Valve isn’t doing that with Steam afaik, actually I’m not aware of any other platform that does this
Valve will even allow developers to create their own Steam keys free of charge and sell them wherever they want with no commission whatsoever
That’s pretty open I’d say
Lol, as long as you properly plan in advance and coordinate such a thing, not the way that uh… Dead Matter tried to do it.
Dear god what a fustercluck.
Any of the video game console companies.
They literally do not lol
In game purchases in steam games don’t have to pay Valve, nor does Valve prevent you from uploading your game to other stores, which is what this ruling was about.
Here comes the Steam defenders.
I have many issues with the gamer deference to the steam monopoly… But they don’t partake in this particular abuse: taking a cut from the dev for all in game purchases. They only take a (sizeable) cut for the initial game purchase.
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If someone purchases a Proton plan through their iOS app, Apple got a 30% cut of that. Which is stupid. Because Proton (and every other company with an iOS app) already pays Apple to simply have their app on Apple’s app store.
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Is that what you’re referring to?
Yes (I thought it was more, but w/e). I’ll admit, I don’t know a whole lot about development and everything that it entails, but nuance is key here. Say what you will about Proton, but this ruling just set a precedent that a company hosting an app/game download cannot take a cut from purchases completed within said app/game. That affects everyone.
I’m just looking at this from a bigger picture perspective. Apple has more than enough money already, and frankly there are far too many companies like this who need to be cut back down.
That explains my experience. I just brought proton vpn for the easiest travel solution for me, and when I was shopping around I thought I was losing my mind. Checked the price online and it was one price and then checked from the Apple app for convenience and it was higher. I was confused, but just bought it online and used it on the app after (along with other devices).
Or he’s just shitting on other companies who he knows are too greedy to do the same. Proton is getting positive press for this and he’s leaning into it with a bit of hyperbole
Not saying he’s a genius or anything, he’s just a spokesperson doing spokesperson things
How many years until prices go up? I bet they marked down 1-2 years where they realize they can’t up the prices. But after, it will creep up.
In a decade it’ll probably be the same price it was last year.
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So, I initially wanted to just kneejerk respond yes, it is absurd to suggest this ruling against Apple… would have any kind of generally noticable effect on inflation.
But I wanted to check the actual numbers.
Ok, so, total US consumer spending in 2024 is about $64 Trillion.
… The Apple App Store generated $105 Billion in revenue in 2024.
Ok, napkin math: 30% off of lets just say literally all App Store payments… , ok, we’ve cut costs by about $32 Billion… shave that off the $64 Trillion…
And voila!
A rough general price reduction of… 0.05%
Call a median US yearly income $60K, and they’ve saved $30 bucks. Maybe the cost of either one or two DoorDash meals, depending on where you live… probably much closer to just one.
We’re saved from inflation rofl!
Yeah, Proton is bucking the obvious trend, with this one. Most companies will totally take the profits rather than lowering prices.
Companies that were app-first like mobile games probably won’t cut prices much if any. Companies that were web-first like Proton and Patreon probably will.
could help cut inflation in the US
I highly doubt Apple App Store revenues are a significant portion of the CPI.
I mean, let’s not kid ourselves that it has no effect, but it’s not even in the basket
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In a sufficiently competitive market, the maximum is related to costs.
Proton is trying to get cheap marketing.
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With enough competition, someone is going to compete on price to attract customers. They obviously can’t sell for less than their costs (again, sufficiently competitive so you don’t get monopolies starving their competition), so that’s the floor for what they can sustainably charge.
It doesn’t matter what the service is, if there are enough viable alternatives, at least one of them will go for the value play. Customers aren’t willing to pay more than they have to, so they’ll be attracted to lower cost options.
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Sure. But if people aren’t willing to pay more than the cost of production, games wouldn’t be made. The cost of production is the floor, and the cost people are willing to pay is the ceiling, and competition finds a line somewhere in the middle. The more competition, the closer it is to the cost of production.
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i’m scared how many ceos don’t understand that rapid fall of inflation or zero inflation is bad because it means your economy is stagnant.
That is a very broad generalization. First of all inflation is not just some co-product of economic activity. It has specific reasons. An economy is not stagnant because the oil price sinks after geopolitical tensions ease. An economy is not stagnant because businesses are kept from price gouging in cartels or monopoly situations.
Also “stagnant” is not inherently bad. The reason why we need economic growth is because the super rich are siphoning off more and more wealth, so economic growth is the only thing keeping poor people from revolting. A zero growth or even degrowth economy could serve the people very well, if wealth wouldn’t be hoarded away by select few.
Do he still think fascism is good for small businesses though?
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Why is it bad though? This business is in no form related to politics. It wouldn’t change fundamentally even if Hitler ran it.
You are not cooking blud
I’m not going to willingly put my money towards someone who supports that kind of thing. The first response to my comment was a very level headed response and provided evidence that he does not directly support the administration.
Still doesn’t provide me a lot of consumer confidence though.
Maybe you should reconsider your threat model. You seem to be very light on information. If political views is an issue than you’re the issue.
Political views are 100% the issue, they drive all other business decisions. If you’re fucked enough to support what’s going on in the US government, I can’t trust you to be a normal human, let alone run a business.
Fuck off with your apologisim for nazis
I bet every company has at least one employee with right-wing political views. Choosing a product based on some random quotes by employees is stupid.
MASSIVE fucking difference between Bob in the warehouse being a racist fuck, and the god damn CEO.
Hold on, racism? We are talking about racism? Did I miss something?
If only he ever said that you weren’t making up bullshit by misrepresenting his statement.
And article on the topic of what Andy Yen said: https://techissuestoday.com/proton-ceo-responds-to-backlash-after-his-post-supporting-trump-selection/
So, while his comment wasn’t entirely neutral I don’t see any endorsement of fascism in there.
I’d say you either openly oppose fascism or you condone it, there are no other possibilities
That’s fair I guess.
It sounds like that is the same as saying “you can’t oppose corporate monopolies without openly opposing fascism”
There is a lot of risk in that sort of intentional abdication of nuance, hopefully self-evident to you and to all who read this.
The difference is that he could have just not said anything, yet he chose to praise Republicans and denounce Democrats. Sure, there’s plenty of reasons to denounce Democrats, but putting that alongside praising Republicans is beyond tone-deaf.
This.
It was the same with Elon before he went head first into facism. They usually start by selling themselves as liberal with some occasional praise of conservatives. Then later claim they are moderate or the go to favorite of tech bros claiming they are libertarian, since saying they are conservative might receive backlash.
It’s always this exact article “on the topic” that gets posted in response. I remember his posts on social networks though.
So not really. Thanks for the actual answer.
Edit: goddamn, you actually changed my view somewhat and people still go piling on lol
https://x.com/andyyen/status/1864436449942110660
Seems pretty clear to me.
Are you kidding? Hating on Andy Yen for saying dumb shit he didn’t actually literally say is basically a Lemmy staple meme by now.
I’m not a Nazi, I just admire their personnel picks. And their economic policy. And their uniforms. And the killing of some jews. But I’m not a Nazi!
I’m so tired
Damn. People here sure love purity testing. The guy could pay for their cancer treatment and still slap him every chance because they got it wrong publicly in the past but once you get it wrong publicly once, you’re out of the club. Go be a conservative we don’t want you. When someone at Tuta has a bad year and ends up in the wrong publicly, find another email service to try and convince people to go too. Probably worse in functionality than Tuta as you go down to smaller and worse funded efforts in this niche field of Internet activism
But people here do it here too to Mozilla because they don’t like their social outreach programs and their attempts to get advertising revenue so screw Mozilla too. So because nothing but perfection is acceptable, push away people that may be adjacent/left leaning right and switch to less developed products. Switch from Firefox and attack Mozilla who do the bulk of Firefox development and use Waterfox who do a custom deployment/build. Pure display of perfection being the enemy of good here.
You want people to embrace privacy but keep whiplashing people around when the org/anyone in leadership says something wrong. Screw Signal, they’re not perfect. Screw Matrix/Element, some developer said something one day so it’s all bad. I’m surprised anyone here uses any privacy software or a major open source software like Linux or Krita or Blender at the risk that someone in the background may be wrong in someway which I am 100% certain they exist in important positions. Same with Lemmy
Go back to the 60s and you all would be shitting on Fred Hampton for accepting the impure and the color coalition for everyone that had ever said something wrong. Al Franken definitely would not make it with y’all. Y’all can’t build up leftist communities because y’all are bitter assholes that can’t move on and spend so much time purity testing. Y’all are probably mediocre too so can’t make a difference in privacy and data ownership activism anyways so should be lining up to support not just Tuta, someone hasn’t screwed up publicly yet, and Proton
Reminds me of Aung San Suu Kyi. She was under the gun of the military ruling class that permitted limited democratic government and because she didn’t make speech as if she lived in the US, a bunch of Americans turned on her and celebrated when the military dictatorship came back to rule and put her in prison the moment it seemed like the civilian government would actually assert more power
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This. It’s amazing how naive people here can be just because they fanboyed some random CEO before they were revealed to be problematic.
That’s just ad hominem to say people are fanboying the CEO. I never heard the name of the CEO until people started complaining about him. Then I read the statements he put out and that people are hysterical over and reading into as if he’s some Trump fanboy. The guys not even an American. He doesn’t live in the US. He just runs a service as an alternative to the big tech companies. Was he even in the US for anything but his university years and he’s 40?
Americans read more into him than his record and statements say. Not everyone’s politics revolve around Americans. I’m waiting for American leftist to turn on Shawn Fain too for supporting Trump auto tariffs and be anti auto workers union because too many in the union are Trump supporters and even someone in opposition like Shawn Fain is supporting a Trump policy. That’s even more direct and influential than a guy in Europe that runs a niche privacy centric internet service company
Problematic, barely. It’s a handful of statements months ago compared to his life of work. Magnifying glass to your whole life and people would likely find something problematic. If this guy is representative of what a problematic person is, the world would be pretty solid. Waste of energy to be so anti this guy and Proton when it’s a service more conducive to privacy rights than anything I or probably any of us have done. Problematic has become such an empty insult with how easily it’s thrown around with such passion. Waste of passion
Yeah a lot of people fan over celeberties politicians or CEO’s, but at the same time a lot of people also hate those same people for various reasons. And people believe in bad against bad and not even the law anymore and don’t believe in second changes or forgiveness.
We call that, the internet.
Louder for the idiots who can’t seem to listen. Preach!
They legally can’t though that’s the thing people are missing
This is literally just insane rambling. You need serious media literacy.
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The premise is already wrong. There was no promise or loyalty, not even close.
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He didn’t endorse the republican party.
The fact that you inflate the meaning of that tweet to make it more meaningful than it is, doesn’t mean he did anything of the sort. The tweet happened after the election but before the government, and it was an endorsement of the antitrust appointee. He also expressed his opinion that republicans were more likely than democrats to fight big tech monopolies in the antitrust space. This is far from an endorsement.
It was also a completely unnecessary comment, in response to nothing.
It was in response to Trump’s tweet about the antitrust appointee. I would say quite relevant context for a tweet about the antitrust appointee.
It was unnecessary, true. Like every tweet. He expressed his unnecessary opinion, the same way we are doing now.
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If they can charge 30% less without Apple’s fees, then why are their prices the same whether you buy on their iOS app or direct on their website? Why have they been overcharging users who don’t buy through the iOS app by 30% all this time?
Old knowledge disclaimer, but if they didn’t change it then:
Because Apple literally tells people that they’re not allowed to charge less somewhere else - at least that was the case several years ago…
Some things do charge different amounts though. YouTube Premium for example is more expensive if you subscribe in iOS but maybe that’s just because it’s Google.
They also could have just not let anyone subscribe through the iOS app. Lots of things do that.
I’ve noticed this too, there’s no consistency. Some companies seem to get away with two prices, others not.
When people tell you the laws are behind internet they’re taking about this all of this ND social media is unregulated but imagine if psychological abuse was the reason social media was successful.
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That isn’t exactly true with Steam. Valve does allow a dev to offer a discount at a different store as long as that same discount comes to Steam in a reasonable amount of time.
Straight from the docs:“It’s OK to run a discount for Steam Keys on different stores at different times as long as you plan to give a comparable offer to Steam customers within a reasonable amount of time.”
That’s probably only for selling steam keys on another store. You might be able to sell non steam versions for any price you want
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Got a link to an article or something discussing that?
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Because Apple prohibited that.
Likely they were not allowed to by the terms they agreed to with apple.
Most favored nation clause. Apple gets the lowest price that you offer. I’d you offer any discounts elsewhere, that have to be the same on the app store
Cool! Still not gonna put all my eggs in the fascist-sympathetic basket
It doesn’t matter either way. Never do it that anyway. You would think people would learn a thing after being thoroughly fucked by apple and google…
It is amazing how sundar and Tim literally violated you in sexually uncomfortable ways but you are crying about Andy being a pathetic regime whore…
“Up to”…… here’s 5% off
Very true. I’m giving you up to* 1000 upvotes.
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Dude thinks he knows everything because he has a PhD in Physics, literally out of touch with the politics that anyone doing 5 minutes of web searching can understand.
This is such a common thing. STEM education needs to be more well rounded.
Why? Idiots thinking they know more than they do won’t be stopped by this. Also if we wanted to round humanities and liberal arts by making it mandatory to pass analysis, linear algebra, organic chemistry and classical physics would just lead to much more people not graduating anything.
School is for a general education. Academia is for specialization.
I can only speak for myself… But I had 2+ years at university before declaring a (STEM) major, allowing me to take courses in political science, history, etc.
So, as someone with a STEM degree, in a field of specialists who have zero understanding of the real world outside of their field, the difference is instantly recognizable.
The idea that a more well rounded education can ever be a bad thing is just straight up ignorant and it comes off as some sort of insecurity on your part.
Nobody is kept from taking additional education if they want to, like you did. But the general education should be from school and school education needs to define the standard of what everyone should know or should at least have known at some point so he or she can refresh upon it.
If you make it mandatory to make academic education contain every subject like school did, you will end up with programs taking 20 years instead of 5 years to graduate. If you want to discriminate against certain subjects you end up in the same trap of defining certain subjects as relevant and others as irrelevant, like the criticized “STEM-lords”
no no, you see Trump is totally anti-big tech. once he bleeds them dry from all the bribes they’ll be gone! /s
What does politics even have to do with a ruling like this? Isn’t the law separated from the government in the US? Or is the US just a corrupt country that allow people to influence the judges ruling to impact the lawsuit in a certain outcome … O wait …
I am sad because of all the people in this thread who think the CEO is “fascist-sympathetic” because he said Trump did something better than the Democrats one time.
Yeah, having only just switched from GMail to Proton last week my heart sank when I saw “Proton are MAGA”.
Then I spent three minutes reading up on it and it’s like, the CEO said one thing about policy on regulation of big tech that was critical of the Democrats for not doing enough, and the internet has decided that means he’s MAGA.
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Republicans tech policy is motivated entirely by the fact that their racist and conspiratorial views were getting them banned on social media sites from 2015 - 2024
And i should care because…? Why should I care why republicans wanted to break up tech monopolies, if breaking monopolies is anyway something that I consider a positive change?
Breaking monopolies give people more choice. More choice (free) leads to hopefully people choosing more privacy conscious tools. More privacy means less data that can be handed over to doge, less data that ICE has to target minorities, etc.
then you either whole-heartedly agree that a group of criminals and wannabe dictators should be able to destroy any business that publishes speech against them, or you are extremely gullible.
Those are not the only 2 options. I am instead very happy that they will do the right thing for the wrong reason, and outside those monopolies more people will choose services that republicans have no power over. Moreover, your whole argument assumes someone is in US. I am sympathetic to the people in US, but tech monopolies are a global problem.
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There are less than 10 companies that control almost the entire tech space. What “fewer choices”…?
Breaking up google would be already enough, which is what the focus was. All your comment sounds very fuzzy to me. Basically the whole antitrust thing is on google, if republicans break it up, great. Which " allies" are they going to bolster?
Absolutely agreed. I think when you have such role in a company you should avoid making political statements at all, because no matter what you say you will end up upsetting some people. In this case, “try-hard” democrats.
Well, it’s worth leveraging your status to communicate to the politicians (i.e. this tweet). In this case, it cost him more than I think he was expecting.
lol that is done with money, not social media posts. A CEO should know that.
why would he want to donate to trump? Public praise is worth more in many instances.
I’m of the opinion he should’ve shut the fuck up or said better words, so I don’t have any interest in trying to answer that for you.
Yeah he should’ve said what he said more tactfully. But sometimes one’s most controversial comments are ones that one wouldn’t have thought would get a lot of attention at all.
Not Even trump, just «the republicans»
It was definitely Trump.
I’m convinced that Trump is just a puppet.
Edit: downvoted by his strings.
No puppet!
No doubt Proton’s CEO will use this to justify his “Trump is better for regulating big tech” claim, while ignoring that the judge is an Obama appointee.
Andy big mad they didn’t invite him to the Inauguration, he should sitting there next to sundar the creep!!!
And Faceberg and Bezonator
Inb4 Trump invents tariffs on foreign coded software
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This the trump-licker? Yeah, bye Proton.
Buh bye now
Thundermail is coming soon. By Mozilla.
That’s the best name by far! Well, I guess second, compared to Thunderbird.
But I already use proton and purchased outside the Apple Store (on the proton website) and use it on my iPhone? What changed?
Nothing
It’s not exactly 30%. For sales below $1M, it’s 15%: https://developer.apple.com/app-store/small-business-program/
In Europe, where this was established last year, they started charging a Core Technology Fee to cover the cost of hosting and data transfer: https://developer.apple.com/support/core-technology-fee/
And if you switch payment providers, you have to pay at least 2.5% plus transaction and any intermediary fees.
It’s nice that Proton is offering a discount, but for everyone else there may be additional ongoing costs.
15% if you know about it, if you apply, if you get accepted
Good watch on this stuff, the recent court decision overall
Dude’s so vindicated. Apple lover who HATES their treatment of developers cases like this.
It’s time to end monopolies
Should have done a valve and allowed selling anywhere but require price parity. Now from their greed there will be financial incentive for people to use another platform.
I thought Valve was the one who created Proton in the first place to let people play games on Linux
Different Proton my dude.
The Proton in the post offers mail, storage, and VPN services.
They did, but you only need that to play windows games. You can also use wine or play native Linux games.
